Melayu Bogel Di Taman

When the real-estate market tanked, Nello decided to pursue his dream of living in California.

He and his sister would share an apartment together in San Diego; on the cross-country drive to their new home, they visited the Grand Canyon and the red rocks of Sedona. They got jobs waiting tables. The last I heard, he was learning how to surf.

When I went home for the holidays that year, I noticed we didn't get the usual card from Nello's family. When I asked my mom about it, she told me we needed to talk. I expected some lame drama about a falling-out she'd had with his mother, but instead she told me that Nello had died. He'd gone swimming in the ocean with a friend one night, and when the other guy couldn't find him, he assumed Nello had walked the few blocks back home. The next morning, after he didn't come home or show up for work, his sister called the police. His body wouldn't wash up for a couple of days. Since my mom said she didn't know how I'd handle the news, she'd waited to tell me in person.

I'd known Nello longer than any man in my life besides my dad, but for the past few years I hadn't really known him. What I'd held onto was an idea of him and what he represented. He was a consolation that no matter how many guys were the kind of jerks who dumped you on Valentine's Day, there was at least one guy out there like Nello: single, handsome, reliable, kind.

In the local paper store, I picked through the sympathy cards. Nothing said anything close to what I was feeling. I stood in the aisle, my throat tight. I decided on a blank one with a wispy watercolor branch that I thought his mother, a painter, might like.

Over Christmas, my family and I watched home videos of Nello and me in the old neighborhood. After about 10 minutes, I was sobbing so loudly that my mom turned off the TV, then sat back down and put her arms around me. Of course I was crying for Nello, for his lovely family, for how unfair his death was, and for how we'd all miss that sweet kid. But what I couldn't say aloud was that I was also crying for myself — a widow of sorts, adrift in this big, scary world, no life raft in sight.

<<<---Back